Monaco Thursday quotes: BMW

Nick Heidfeld: - 22nd: "I was quite happy with the balance of the car, but it is unfortunate I was only able to do ten laps. This was a shame as it is very important to do as many laps as possible here in the practice sessions. On the postive side, we were still able to collect some data and also do a few practice starts."

Robert Kubica - 26th: "I am a great fan of street circuits so it was a good experience to drive an F1 car here. From the start I think I was on the pace as regards lap times. Unfortunately we never managed to complete our planned programmes in either practice session. We did some important tyre testing, even though the long runs were interrupted by red flags. But then the electronic problem caused me to crash and the session was over for us."

Mario Theissen (BMW Motorsport Director): "Robert's incident cannot be blamed on driver error, but an electronic failure. This was also why he stopped in the morning practice. Currently we are trying to figure out the reason for the failure and, as a precaution, we kept the cars in the garage. This meant we couldn't complete our programme, but we still collected enough data to make our tyre choice."

Willy Rampf (Technical Director Chassis): "We have done set-up work today based on the data we collected at the Paul Ricard test. The drivers were very happy with the progress despite our problems. In Monaco it is important to have a car with very precise steering because here there is no room for errors. An electronic problem curtailed our programme, but we are confident we already have enough information."